


A Lock Without Its Key

by satoh



Series: Heart and Soul [3]
Category: Thor (Comics)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-31
Updated: 2012-07-31
Packaged: 2017-11-11 02:41:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/473587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/satoh/pseuds/satoh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the beginning, Serrure had Clé.<br/>When Clé left, he was on his own.<br/>But now, even after all this, he was still alone. <br/>(Serrure's background)</p><p>AU where Thor finds Serrure (kid!Loki) in Paris but does not take him back to Asgard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Lock Without Its Key

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_Oh this was almost too easy. The stupid fat man wasn't paying attention at all. Clé was just behind him, making sure the fat man was not looking his way._

_  
_

_Reaching... closer... closer..._

 

_Caught._

 

_Shit._

 

 _“What are you doing?” He looks up to see a big blond man. Curse this, was this a new worker? He couldn't have been here long, he and Clé knew the fat man's routines for_ _his stand so well, stealing from him was easy as cake._

 

_Think, Serrure, think! He needed to stall just long enough until Clé showed up. The idea came to him quickly. “Oh, monsieur, please, my brother, he's sick. We're hungry. Please.” Serrure looked up to the big man with the biggest eyes he could muster. Women fell for it all the time. He wasn't sure if it could work with the big guy._

 

_The big guy's eyes softened. Bingo, Serrure thought, as he saw Clé come behind and kick the big guy's shins. The momentary distraction loosened the big guy's hold on Serrure and allowed him to run away with the bread still at hand. He headed for their escape route with Clé following suit. They ran and ran until they knew they were completely out of potential danger._

 

_“Man, that was close!” Clé said, after catching his breath._

 

_“Not at all, we've had closer.” Serrure replied._

 

_“Oh, yeah, like that one time someone accused you of cheating! Well, of course you were, but he had no proof, you were flawless, Silver tongue.”_

 

_“Of course,” Serrure laughs. It was just a nickname only Clé used._

 

For as long as they could remember, it had been Clé and Serrure. Serrure and Clé. At the orphanage, they were inseparable. Clé was older than Serrure by two years and called Serrure little brother. Serrure grew fond of the title, but he was never able to bring himself to call Clé his older brother.

 

They did everything together, even though they both had very different interests. Clé loved sports. Always wanting to play tag, basketball, football. Serrure on the other hand, loved reading and drawing. Regardless, they still became close. When Clé wanted to play ball, Serrure would join. When Serrure just wanted to sit under a tree and read a book, to everyone's surprise, Clé would pick up a book too. (But then promptly fell asleep, unless he was peering over Serrure's shoulders as he read.)

 

And when Serrure turned six, Clé had been picked by a young couple to adopt. Of course they would pick Clé. He was athletic, had charisma, and was generally, a very enthusiastic boy. The kind adults liked. But Clé refused to leave with them without Serrure. He didn't have much say in the matter legally, but the couple did not want to upset him. They considered Serrure but by the end of the week, they decided they couldn't take two children. But Serrure knew better, the couple may not have wanted two children, but he knew the tipping point was that they didn't like him at all. Genius as he may have been, the adults at the orphanage labeled him a trouble maker, always there to make chaos.

 

Serrure shrugged. Not like he could help it. Clé didn't think too much about the adoption or that couple, he didn't want to leave without Serrure anyway. He would never blame Serrure for something like that.

 

But when Clé turned ten, the orphanage couldn't keep him anymore. There were no resources to keep a boy at that age. He was to be sent to a foster home. Serrure found out and planned to run away before Clé could be taken away.

 

And they ran to the city that night. They had found temporary shelter for housing. They learned to pickpocket tourists. Serrure learned to tweak his expressions. He could cry on the spot if needed. Adults were so stupid, they believed anything. Eventually, they made enough money to pay for a tiny apartment, (more like an upgraded shack), right above a slightly bigger shack like place. It was cramped, but they survived. It didn't matter that they had to share a bed. They had too many adventures together for it to matter.

 

But only four months later, Serrure woke up to find Clé gone. That wasn't all too strange, Clé could have gone to get their breakfast (for once, not waiting for Serrure to go with him. It wasn't _that_ hard.) But when he didn't come back late afternoon. Serrure got worried and went out to find Clé.

 

After an entire night of searching, Serrure was at loss of where Clé could have gone. He was never one to hope for anything better. He knew the harsh realities of life. Dreaming was those who still believed, or were ignorant of those realities. There was an infinite number of horrible things that could have happened to his friend. But for Clé, Serrure imagined for a bit. Pretended. Maybe Clé had found the jackpot. He could live well off for the rest of his life without having to worry anymore. But he couldn't come back to Serrure because.... because otherwise... otherwise, Serrure wouldn't get his chance to get the jackpot. So Clé made the decision to stay away. It was alright. The scene wasn't real anyway.

 

He was a lock without his key. But still, life went on. Serrure didn't need anyone but himself.

 

He still lived in a shack, right above the landlady, a frail old woman who let them stay there for close to nothing. The placed was too cramped for anything but a bed and small desk to fit. But without Clé, the bed felt bigger, almost bare. No matter, it was comfortable now. The only bathroom was next to the old lady’s place on the first floor. The kitchen was inside her place, so Serrure frequented the landlady’s home. It seemed after Clé's absence, she was nicer and always welcomed him. Maybe she realized his unapparent sadness. Food was provided by the old lady sometimes, but other times, Serrure went out to find it. He made some money from a bit of gambling but that could only go so far. Most adults didn’t game with eight year olds.

 

Eventually, he moved on. Two years later, Clé became just some person, a buddy he had, who teamed up with him to “earn” some money. No more than that. Serrure focused on his work. He had found someone his age who had ran away from the outskirts of Paris. The “work” was a simple game to do with reading card. He distracted customers whilst his accomplice pick pocketed them. Serrure was very skilled with that too, but compared to his partner in crime, he was infinitely better with words.

 

It wasn’t the greatest life, but he had fun. He lived, survived. It was what he knew.

 

But there would be these moments, as Serrure shuffled the cards, or when he took a bite out of the baguette he just took, or when he was lying down on the grass in the park early morning, before anyone got there, he would imagine. Because, again, dreams were for the believers, and Serrure was past believing in hopes. Nothing in life will just work out for you if you didn't do something about it. But he would let go of that mentality sometimes, and realize, hey, he was just a kid.

 

A little imagination wouldn't hurt.

 

So just for a while, he let his mind run wild.

 

Then one day, before he tread up the stairs to his bed, the old lady called him over and handed him a letter. Who would ever send him a letter? He read through the contents of the letter, (he had learned to read back at the orphanage) confused, thinking, was this some kind of joke?

 

He looked up at the old lady who had already walked into her home. Then a hand was placed on his shoulder. He turned around to see some man in a suit and sun glasses. (which was absurd Serrure thought, because the sun had already set, what use were the lenses?)

 

And that was when everything changed.

 

He was told to get into the car that pulled up. Serrure weighed the pros and cons of his situation. Well, worse comes to worse, he knew how to get out of even the worst scenarios. He was brought to an apartment. The man in suit and sunglasses said nothing the entire way. He was handed keys, Serrure assumed they were for the apartment.

 

It was the last time he saw the man in suit and sun glasses.

 

Oh but he saw the car once in a while. Well, sort of.

 

Serrure slept well for the first time since Clé's absence.

 

The next day, a woman had arrived to take him to school. There he was registered in the private school for the young and gifted. Serrure had no idea why, but whoever was sending him to this place thought he was fit for the place. Well, why not. Serrure always had a genuine curiosity for knowledge.

 

It was all so sudden, but Serrure adjusted quickly, as if he had never lived in poverty. Just yesterday he was living in a shack (which had nothing of his anyway, he wouldn't miss that place much) and now, he lived comfortably in an apartment with its own kitchen and bathroom and a giant bedroom.

 

Though, going to school took another week of getting used to, he was interested enough to wake up every day for it. He had remembered back at the orphanage, if you didn't wake up on time, there would be no breakfast for you. Even though now, he always had something to eat, going to school seemed like the right thing to do. He heard you could actually learn more skills there. (He'd have to see about that.)

 

School was boring at times. Serrure found no one to talk to that was on the same intellect level as he. He started to play little tricks here and there. Eventually, Even at the school of the young and gifted, in just two weeks, the teachers realized his his sleeping in class was due to boredom of the easy material and was placed in classes with students three to four years older than him. Though, that didn't really help Serrure gain any more friends.  In the month since he started school, he had made a name for himself around the school. The older kids called him a conceited brat. It wasn't his fault they weren't any smarter even though they had at least four years of learning over him. Pity, a waste really. The kids his age thought he was arrogant because he never spoke to anyone his age. It also wasn't his fault that they couldn't understand him. Literally. And the kids younger pretty much feared him. It didn't help that Serrure was a bit on the small side for his age, making him look younger than he was.

 

Oh well, it made school more interesting. 

 

At the same time, packages would arrive once a month along with an envelope of money for food. At first, the packages were full of books, ranging from Shakespeare to textbooks to educational magazines. Eventually Serrure got bored of it, and whoever sent them seemed to know, so he got other things. The latest toys and clothes, but he grew tired of those too quickly. Mostly because those toys were for boys eight and under and the clothes didn’t fit his style. Oh, and he got a bike too.

 

Then he’d get the most recent gadgets. A high tech cellular, a few game stations, even a giant Television set was shipped in.

 

But the IPad was his favorite. Awesome stuff.

 

Sometimes, Serrure would wonder about his provider. Some sort of sugar daddy? That was a strange label, it could have been a woman. Whoever it was, unless.... Serrure thought suspiciously. Well, if it came down to that, Serrure knew how to escape.

 

However, in terms of finding out the sender, the annoying thing was that the packages never had a return address. Serrure thought the sender most likely wanted to remain anonymous, so of course, it’d be incredibly stupid to have a return address. And the packages were always sent by before he got home. (And one time, he stayed home on the predicted date of the delivery. Serrure fell asleep waiting and when he woke up, it was there, right in front of the door.)

 

And sometimes there would be those car rides.

 

A car would be there some mornings to take Serrure to school. Again, the distance to school was short, but a ride was cool too. The driver was different every single time and whatever Serrure said no matter how irritating, constant he’d be, the driver would not say anything. So no new Intel there. His benefactor, or super rich anonymous donor, was serious about keeping his or her identity.

 

Thn there were those occasional suspicious people outside his place. Serrure would notice them while he walked home. He would glance in the direction he noticed them but the next time he looked, they were gone.

 

It didn’t happen often, so Serrure was never prepared for it. Otherwise he’d devise a plan to catch one of them and bring them in for questioning.

 

Eventually, he stopped caring too much about his benefactor.

 

Life took a different turn. He hadn't thought about how much better life became, because in Serrure's eyes, he could live any way and be able to survive. He knew how to use his wits. But when he did think about it, he thought back on the time he imagined of a different life. What had he imagined then? He imagined... a life with parents. But that was quickly erased as he believed most adults were stupid and foolish. He imagined...What if Clé were still here? Wishful thinking, even too much for his imagination. But that was just what he imagined. He imagined a life where he wasn't on his own. 

 

He just didn't want to be by himself anymore.

 

And even now, with all he had, he was still alone.

 

It didn't matter.

 

He was tough.

 

He wouldn't be broken so easily.

 

Think of the benefits of this kind of life. Hey, free stuff was free stuff. 

**Author's Note:**

> Serrure in french means Lock.  
> Clé means Key.  
> Corny name is corny.  
> Corny title is also corny.  
> Clé is an OC. He may or may not be mentioned later. He will most likely not reappear.


End file.
